butlincat's blog - a blog...a seeker of the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth...

butlincat's blog...a seeker of the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth...

This site is shadowbanned, as daily viewing figures prove since March 2018, when before then the figures were 10 times as much as they have been since. "Shadowbanning" is the act of blocking or partially blocking a user or their content from an online community - see more: What is SHADOWBANNING: Twitter: are you shadowbanned? - truther sites are targeted, eg:NewsGuard Launches War on Alternative Media - "Censorship is the tool of those who have the need to hide actualities from themselves and from others." - Charles Bukowski

“As long as justice is postponed we always stand on the verge of these darker nights of social disruption”...so said Martin Luther King Jr. in a speech on March 14, 1968, just three weeks before he was assassinated.

Tuesday, 23 January 2018

Days ago soldiers stormed my house in the dead of night and dragged my 16-year-old daughter to prison. Now my little girl is in a cold cell, alone.

I have dedicated my life to civil resistance. That's why the army is holding my baby -- they want to crush our spirit. But I have been a member of Avaaz for eight years -- I have seen the power of this community if we all stand together against injustice.

My little girl's case goes to court on 31 January -- that's our chance to get her out and shine a light on hundreds of other child prisoners just like her. Please join my urgent call below with one click -- we’ll deliver it directly to global leaders:

When I saw her in court she was pale and shivering, shackled and clearly in pain. I wanted to cry but I couldn’t, I have to stay strong so she stays strong.

The judge just refused bail and now my child could spend years behind bars. They took her away for slapping a heavily armed commander after his soldiers shot her little cousin in the face. Now they are charging her with 12 new crimes. There is no reason for her to be held while the case goes to trial.

Over 12,000 Palestinian children have been arrested since 2000! No matter where you stand on this conflict, we can all agree no child should be thrown into prison.

I have personally reached out to diplomats. But my voice alone is not strong enough. That's why I'm appealing to you to stand with me now. We know the military judges don’t want global attention on them, and Israel's politicians don't want the issue of child prisoners to become a massive public scandal. Add your name -- we only have days:

Our Israeli lawyer has presented multiple precedents to the court of adult Israelis who slapped soldiers and were released within hours. But even though my daughter is a child, she’s Palestinian. 99% of cases against us are convictions in this military system.

I have been inspired by this movement's strength and passion for freedom, justice, and creating a better world for the next generation. That's why I am reaching out to you -- because I know that if anyone can free my daughter and all the children it is the Avaaz community.

With hope and determination,

Basem Tamimi with the Avaaz team

My 16-year-old daughter was dragged out of her bed in dead of night and arrested. Even though she is just a child, the military refused to release her. She could spend years in jail. I have dedicated my life to achieving peace and justice in the Middle East. That's why the army is holding my baby -- their revenge is to crush my family. All I want is to hold my daughter again. With one click, please join my appeal to get her out:

Sunday, 7 January 2018

We seem to be used to cruel images showing children in the middle of wars, misery, and starvation. Calls for donations for children in Yemen, Syria, or Africa are often made. But what has become more apparent is that images of Palestinian children under Jewish occupation are almost never shown, and calls for donations are never made.

An image is doing the rounds!

By Evelyn Hecht-Galinski, English translation by Milena Rampoldi

We seem to be used to cruel images showing children in the middle of wars, misery, and starvation. Calls for donations for children in Yemen, Syria, or Africa are often made. But what has become more apparent is that images of Palestinian children under Jewish occupation are almost never shown, and calls for donations are never made.

After the cruel images of the 50-days Israeli orgy of violence against Gaza “Protective Edge,” during which among the 2.205 murdered Palestinians there were also 480 children to be mourned and thousands of others injured including hundreds severely injured to the extent of being handicapped for the rest of their lives. These children never made the news headlines. Not to mention the countless orphans and half-orphans!

Even if the tragedy of the predicted uninhabitability of the destroyed Gaza Strip becomes apparent — the promised reconstruction by the “community of values” has yet to happen — the urgent necessity for medical aid is anotherdisaster, the school education system remains under the Israeli blockade and at the hands of the Israeli regime, but only a small part of the media covers this reality.

Another reality is the military detention of Palestinian children who are exposed to physical and psychological violence without any protection. For the Israeli military law, the compliance with children’s rights during interrogations in the illegally occupied Palestinian territories does not exist at all. Children who are arrested because they throw a stone, are exposed to the occupation power without any protection and may get maximum penalties up to 20 years because of their resistance.

The “Jewish defence soldiers” treat Palestinian children without any respect. These children are just struggling for their freedom. The shameful occupation policy of collective punishment does not exclude children and is applied with brutal force. For this purpose, also dogs, in particular German shepherds, are used to chase frightened children. This reminds me the stories of my father of his times in the Nazi concentration camp. There similar methods were used against frightened Jewish prisoners.

While Judaic settlers are protected by “Jewish defence soldiers,” defenceless Palestinian children are exposed to settler violence. All additional announcements of authorisations of new settler home units is exacerbating thesituation.

Violence, intimidation, and humiliation in the illegally occupied Palestine happens daily and is accepted by the hypocritical “community of values” without any criticism. Even statements by the activists of “Breaking the Silence,” which should shake everybody, have remained without any consequences up to now.

The systematic policy of arbitrarily imprisoning Palestinian children is horrifying and is not restricted to minors. According to the Palestinian politician Mustafa Barghuti, since 2000, 12.000 Palestinian children between 12 and 17 have been arrested by the “Jewish security forces,” for minor offences like throwing stones and that number has since dramatically increased by.

Organisations for the protection of children such as DCIP (Defence for Children International-Palestine) have published research studies which prove that children’s rights are violated after their arrest and interrogation as for example with regards to information about their rights including the right to have a parent or solicitor present.

Even though according to the UN children rights convention every child has the right to be visited by the family, this right can also be denied for weeks to the Palestinian kids in prison. The child welfare organisation UNICEF, which referred to “children’s mistreatment” in 2013 as a “diffused, systematic and institutionalised phenomenon,” with theadditional damning verdict that: “there is no other country in the world where children are systematically brought before the military tribunal.” B`Tselem has also denounced the double standards in the treatment of Jewish/Israeli and Palestinian children. Israeli children are not sentenced to prison.

This state of affairs is reflected in the racist discrimination in the illegally occupied West Bank where there are two parallel “legal systems”: while for the Judaic settlers and land occupiers the Israel civil law is applied, the Palestinian occupied population is sentenced according to military law. According to the Israeli civil law, children are criminally responsible from the age of 14, while according to the military law, Palestinian children are criminally responsible from the age of 14. While an Israeli guy is treated as an adult before the civil court at the age of 18, a Palestinian is treated as an adult before the military court at the age of 16. Welcome to the “Jewish Apartheid State”!

Human rights organisations have been criticising this treatment for a long time, by pointing to the traumas of children and young people because they are almost always arrested during the night, when hordes of “Jewish defence soldiers” surround houses to attack them, to arrest the alleged stone-thrower, by denying parents to accompany the kid.

They also do not stop at the destruction of Palestinian property and in 20% of the cases violence is applied. As Palestinian solicitors regularly report, during interrogations a confession is forced. In some cases, Israeli authorities do not even stop at threats of sexual violence. With this threat, for Israeli security forces it is an easy game to force a confession. After up to 6 months provisional detention according to military jurisdiction the frightened kids and young people confess to almost anything, if you consider that they are also without legal assistance.

The presumption of innocence does not apply to Palestinians and the release on bail is denied in the majority of the cases. What remains, are traumatised children. The “Jewish State” signed the children’s rights convention, but this convention is just valid for Jewish-Israeli children, while Palestinian children living under occupation are defenceless.

Since their childhood, Palestinian children have known nothing apart from a horrifying daily life under occupation with check points, humiliations, arbitrariness, and indignity. If they oppose the arbitrary confiscation of Palestinian property, land, or houses of their families by throwing stones, they are put into jail.

Now an image is doing the rounds: the photo of Ahed Tamimi, a wonderful Palestinian girl, defying the ugly symbol of injustice, by slapping the face of an Israeli “defence soldier,” Ahed Tamimi comes from a famous family of the Palestinian resistance against Zionist occupation: parents, uncle and aunt have been arrested; another uncle was killed, and a cousin lays in a coma after a headshot. This last person was the trigger of the actual resistance actions. However, the story had already begun in 2009, when the inhabitants of the Palestinian village Nabi Saleh protested against the land and resource grabbing for the illegal extension of the Jewish settlement of Halamish.

The “balanced” representation in the German media of the heroic family with their unbending resistance against the illegal Jewish occupation cannot be taken seriously. The “slapping” Ahed Tamimi is the pure image of the resistance. And neither the media nor Israeli right-wing extremist politicians can drag it through the mud.

After this slap, in the night, the henchmen of the occupation, dragged this brave, courageous girl from her bed. They arrested her like a criminal. And up to today, she has been in prison. She has to appear before a military court. While war minister Lieberman is foaming with rage, and wishes her, her parents, and her “environment” all imaginable penalties, the uneducated minister of education Bennett calls for “life imprisonment.” A real state under the rule of law, this Israeli state of occupiers!!

The same can be said about the homicide of the wheelchair user Ibrahim Abu Thurayeh, who lost both legs during an air raid of the “Jewish Star of David bombers” in 2008, and was shot to death by “Jewish defence soldiers” in December, after the protests in the Gaza Strip. The inhuman response of the army after the investigation succinctly read: “No moral or professional error was determined.” Like Ahed Tamimi’s photo, also this image did the rounds as symbol of Palestinian heroism against the occupation and ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

I would like to know how long it will take for the German government and the EU to oppose these Israeli crimes including crimes against international law and human rights, committed by the so called “only” democracy of the Middle East, and by the so called “most moral” army of the world.

It is surprising that considering this horrifying Israeli cabinet, the CDU/CSU faction is inclined to submit a decision to the Bundestag, exactly on 27 January, to threaten with expulsion all Muslim immigrants who call for Jewish hatred, refuse Jewish life in Germany or doubt about the existence right of Israel.

In my opinion, this is just shameful news that avoids any criticism against Israel! As expected, the president of the Central Council of German Jews Schuster was excited. He supports the request and thinks that such a law will protect democracy in Germany.

Mr Schuster, I can do without this “protection,” since democracy in Germany is at risk because of Jewish officials like you, who do not dissociate themselves from the Jewish anti-democratic crimes, committed in the “Jewish State” and turn the mood against Muslim refugees. You are a shame for all other Jewish citizens in Germany who still have some decency.

And you, Chancellor Merkel, defending “Jewish-Christian values”, stand for democratic values in the “Jewish State,” since the crimes committed in the Jewish State are not “self-defence,”, but Israeli cruelties you cannot blandish!

After Ibrahim Abu Thurayeh’s image, the photo of Ahed Tamimi is also doing the rounds. The legitimate Palestinian resistance is unbroken, and we will support it!

THE PALESTINIAN HEROINE THAT WENT VIRAL

January 10, 2017 "Information Clearing House" - Israeli forces have killed three of its family members and arrested scores of others, including 16-year old Ahed, but the Tamimi family continues its non-violent struggle for Palestinian freedom. We speak to Manal Tamimi about her recent imprisonment and her family's defiant activism

AARON MATÉ: It's the Real News. I'm Aaron Maté. In recent weeks, people around the world have learned of Palestinian resilience through the plight of the Tamimi family in the occupied West Bank. For years, the Tamimis have led protest against the Israeli occupation and theft of Palenstinian land. Then last month, 16-year-old Ahed Tamimi became a global symbol of resistance when she was arrested for slapping an Israeli soldier who was trespassing on her property. Just earlier, Ahed's cousin, Mohammed Tamimi, was shot in the face, leaving him in a coma. Ahed remains in Israeli military prison and is charged with multiple counts of assault. Then last week, Israeli forces shot dead Ahed's 17-year-old cousin, Musab Tamimi, at a protest in the West Bank. As he was laid to rest, just before, Israel released another cousin, Noor Tamimi, on bail.

Joining me now is Manal Tamimi. She was also arrested last week at a protest calling for her relatives' release. Welcome, Manal. Thank you so much for joining us. It's hard to know where to start, given how much has happened to your family, but let's start with your own case. You were arrested at a protest calling for the release of Ahed, Noor, and Ahed's mother. What happened to you?

MANAL TAMIMI: First, I want to thank you for giving me the chance to talk about what's really going on with our family and in the village. Actually what happened that we decide to make ... we made a protest. First, in solidarity with Ahed and Nariman, because they had the trial in Ofer prison, which is the only Israeli prison in the West Bank, and then also in solidarity with female prisoners in the Israeli prison.

After nearly two or three minutes of beginning the protest, actually it was gathering, and suddenly they began to shoot tear gas at us and one of the soldiers, she came to me, and she asked me to go back. When I refused, she immediately arrested me without any justification or without even warning, and then they told me that I tried to ... I attacked this soldier and that I was organizing illegal activity in a closed military zone.

AARON MATÉ: What happened to you after you were taken to prison, after you were arrested?

MANAL TAMIMI: After, when she took me back to the Ofer prison, and there we were away from the media and the cameras, they began, and she began to beat me, and I had bleeding in the jaw that I all the time in the prison I was very sick, and I was under extreme pain, and then they took me to interrogation where they kept me the whole night until 12:30 at night, outside, in cold. They took me inside for interrogation. Then they took me back, took me outside in the cold, and without food, without the water, without anything. And by the end of the interrogation they sent me to Hasharon prison where Nariman and I reached the prison around 4:00 in the morning, and then after that the trial began. I had two trials. I had to go back to Ofer prison, which is around three hours from Hasharon. Hasharon, it's in Netanya and inside occupied [inaudible 00:04:31] and the Ofer is in West Bank in the Ramallah area.

We, of course, just going to there from one prison to another, it's a torture because they put you in a bus made of cells, metal, with metal chair. You can't move or without ... The cell is very small that you can't move, and it's black without windows or anything, and they took us from Hasharon at 2:30 in the morning, and we were back at 12:00 at night. The next day is the same. At 2:30 in the morning, we have to leave to the court and go back [inaudible 00:05:21], so it simply it's exhausting, and in the same time they, in this buses during the taking us to the court, they put us with the Israeli criminals -- men, not women -- in the same place. So this is also where terrifying because most of them are ... Well, one of them, he was drunk and he was fight. I think he had the drug or something, and he all the time he was trying to attack us and it was so scary and all the time we were terrified that one of them can attack us.

AARON MATÉ: As you were released, your cousin, Musab Tamimi, he was shot dead in the occupied West Bank at a protest. He was 17 years old.

MANAL TAMIMI: Yes.

AARON MATÉ: If I have this right, if I have this correct, he is the third member of your family to be killed by Israeli forces. Can you tell us about him, and were you able to go to his funeral?

MANAL TAMIMI: Actually, Musab, he was killed while I was in prison. I was back from the prison clinic because I was very sick, and we were watching TV, and suddenly I saw him on the TV saying that Musab Tamimi, he was shot and killed. Of course, this is one of the most difficult experiences anybody could go through to see your cousin and his blood on TV while you don't understand what's going on and what's happening, and you will think about the other, what happened with [inaudible 00:07:20].

So then at night, I was released then the ... Musab, he was an active young man. He has many dreams want to come true. He wanted to study. He was so clever. He was this kind of person who loved life to that end, and always he was ... They used to live in Jordan, and they just came back to Palestine a few months ago, so he was so happy that finally he is in his country among his family with his people. But a sniper, well, he shot him, and it was clear that it ... It's assassination. It's not a random shooting. By the way, the bullet went in his [inaudible 00:08:21]. Of course, one of them, the difficult times we are facing with the attack, the rest of the women, the attack at the village, but Musab, he's the third member of my family who was killed the non-violent resistance that we began in 2009, but actually 22 Tamimi has been killed since 1976 until now, during the resisting the occupation.

AARON MATÉ: Manal, can you tell us about that, these protests that your family has been involved in for years now against the Israeli theft of your land and water sources? This is not something that began recently, and this is something that goes on on a weekly basis. Can you just explain to us, for people who aren't familiar with what your family has done to defend your land in the occupied territories?

MANAL TAMIMI: Actually we are resisting since the beginning of occupation, but our organized resistance, it began in the ninth of December 2009. After we lost two-thirds of the village land, due to the settlement, expansion. The settlement, it's called Halamish, and it's been built in 1976, after the settler took over British police stations, since the British men did, and since that time, they began to expand the settlement, and they began to get land under different justification, either that natural expansion for the settlement or for the clearing of state land or a closed military zone. So every time they change the excuse but always it's about the thefting of the land.

So in 2009, when they took the spring, we decide that we have to begin our nonviolent, organized protest in the village. What we mainly wanted to do is to march toward the spring and [inaudible 00:10:51] there and planting new trees and just to ensure that this is a Palestinian land, not [inaudible 00:11:01]. But the Israeli response were very violent. They began to use different kinds of tear gas, which contain white phosphorus, nerve gas, and other chemicals of this kind. They began to use live ammunition and steel-coated bullets, the same kind that they shot Mohammed, that they two weeks ago, and he was so lucky that he survived.

Also, skunk water which is a chemical substance mixed with water with a very bad smell, like dead animals, the smell, and they tried to hose you with this [inaudible 00:11:44] water [inaudible 00:11:48] was the intention that [inaudible 00:11:52] because we already have problems with water. We only have 12 hours a week water.

Since 2009 until now, the village count is 650 residents. 550 of them have been injured, and 215 have been arrested, including 44 child and 10 women. We have 12 demolition orders and also 38 houses partially burned of gas canister. So all this or this collective punishment for the village, just because of the choice of non-violent resistance, just people who trying to march or express their opinion peacefully, children, men, women. So there's no need for such a force to stop us. Of course, the worst thing about this that we have to lose or we lost Rushdi, who was 30 years old, and he has a three years old daughter, Mustafa, who was 28 years old and recently Musab who's 17, and another guy who was 80, and he's from a nearby village, but he was shot and killed in the village during one of the protests.

AARON MATÉ: And Mohammed, your 15-year-old cousin, as you say, almost lost his life, was left in a coma.

MANAL TAMIMI: Yeah.

AARON MATÉ: And let's hear from him. He recently spoke to the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, in a video, and he told his story of what happened.

Mohammed Tamimi: When we got to the villa, I stood up on the wall, and I didn't know that the army was there. I didn't see a single soldier, and then the soldier shot me, and I lost consciousness. They took us to Beit Rema hospital nearby. They didn't know what to do with me, and they didn't do anything, so they took me to a hospital in Ramallah where they operated on me for six hours. I didn't get up for a week afterwards because of the pain in my head. Because of what happened to my head, I can't leave my house for six months for school or to go into town. This is because I don't have a skull here in my head.

AARON MATÉ: So that's 15-year-old Mohammed Tamimi telling his story of what happened to him. Now, it was after he was shot in the face and left in a coma that Ahed Tamimi heard this news, was distraught, and when an Israeli soldier trespassed on her property, that's when she was seen slapping him. Manal, let me ask you, you're describing these years of nonviolent Palenstinian resistance that your family's been involved in, and here in the West we're supposed to revere nonviolence. We hear often about questions of Palestinians, "Why aren't Palestinian's non-violent," but the reaction to Ahed Tamimi and your family has not been overwhelmingly positive. I mean even for those who acknowledge what happened, we get headlines like this.

So I want to read you a couple of headlines from U.S. media, okay? The first one is from CNN, and it says, "Ahed Tamimi, Palenstinian heroine or dedicated troublemaker?" Okay, and the next one from Newsweek says ... This is Newsweek, and it says, "Despite her age, Ahed Tamimi has a long history of assault against police and soldiers." So Manal, I'm just wondering your reaction. When you hear that, when you hear that that's how some Western media outlets are portraying your family, your thoughts?

MANAL TAMIMI: First, I feel sorry that this media, it's obviously that they are brainwashed and they are adopting the Israeli story, and either they're not preparing or they didn't ask what's really happening. Ahed, she never went to a settlement, so threatening settlers is lie. She never went to inside [inaudible 00:16:36] to try to bomb herself or ... All the incidents, all the videos that you saw, for most of it or all of it, it's in the village, and it's in the front of her house. It's in her property or in her [inaudible 00:16:53]. So actually they are the one who's storming the village, threatening our lives, put our children lives in danger, and they want us just to say hi for them or just to keep silent without doing anything, which is impossible.

Anybody in the world, any person who feels that his children in danger or he feels that he cannot lose one of his family members, his normal reaction will be the same reaction that Ahed did. She didn't do anything. We, all of us, we thought that Mohammed, he died and he lost his life, and it's one of the most difficult moment after the death of Rushdi and Mustafa, and saw dying in front of us. The whole village saw them dying, and it was everything or with all the force that Israeli authority is using against us, it's very difficult to think that we're going to lose another member of the family. So it was a very normal reaction, and [inaudible 00:18:03] she's a child. She's not ... She's still a teenager, and she shouldn't be treated this way.

Israel, they was ... In the West Bank, we are living under the military law and they legitimize arresting children from 11 years up, and they can put them in jail for life, and there is another law that they can put children for up to 20 years for throwing rocks only. In the time that the Israeli or the settler child would living in the same area around only 500 meters from us, they are allowed to throw rocks. They are allowed to threatening our lives, and they are ... they will be treated under the civilian law. This is not a democratic state. It will never be ... It's not democratic so these two children in the same place different law. One to call him a terrorist, a criminal, and other one to call him a victim.

So I hope that people, they won't listen to this media, and they can [inaudible 00:19:31] they can go to Nabi Saleh, or go [inaudible 00:19:34] Tamimi, and they will see or they can go to YouTube to Bilal Tamimi channel on YouTube, and they can see the horrible life we are living and what we have to face in the occupation because we took the decision to stay on our land and to fight for our right.

AARON MATÉ: Manal Tamimi, we have to leave it there. We thank you so much for joining us.

MANAL TAMIMI: You're so welcome, and thank you again for giving me this chance.

AARON MATÉ: Thank you. Thank you, and thank you for joining us on the Real News.